Wits seeking a quickfire strike
Bidvest Wits will spend the week in KwaZulu-Natal to play catch-up in the Absa Premiership title race.
Gavin Hunt (Pic Sydney Mahlangu/ BackpagePix)
The Clever Boys’ participation in the 2019-20 Caf Confederation Cup has seen their domestic league season severely disrupted.
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Wits currently find themselves some 18 points behind league-leaders Kaizer Chiefs, but Gavin Hunt’s side have five games in hand on Amakhosi, and five or six games in hand on the other teams in the top flight, except for Mamelodi Sundowns.
Even in the case of Caf Champions League-embroiled Masandawana, who Wits will play in at home at the Moses Mabhida Stadium in Durban on Tuesday next week, the Clever Boys head into tonight’s game away to Golden Arrows at the Sugar Ray Xulu Stadium with four games in hand of Pitso Mosimane’s Sundowns.
Games in hand are not points in hand, but 16 points from eight games – as Wits have – is an achievable haul and might even be a title-winning pace were it not for Chiefs’ unbelievable start to the season.
Wits will play three league games before the Christmas break. They also face Cape Town City at Bidvest Stadium on December 20.
However, they are also playing Al-Nasr of Libya in their third Caf Confederation Cup Group C match on December 29.
Still, if Wits can pick up maximum points from their next three Premiership games, they will certainly climb the table.
This is also not a forgone conclusion, with Sundowns to come, and Arrows this evening a tricky opponent in their own right.
Steve Komphela’s side went into this week’s fixtures fourth on the table, despite losing their last league match at Black Leopards, a result that may well have hurt Komphela more than most, given his personal duel with Luc Eymael.
Arrows have not been beaten in the league at home this season, though Wits also boast an impressive away record – they lost just two league games on the road last season and none yet this season.
The Clever Boys, indeed, were the last team to win an Absa Premiership game at Arrows, picking up a 1-0 win at the Princess Magogo Stadium on the final day of last season.
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